(William) Billy Waters

Stock No: 001797

Height: 8.5 Inches / 22 cm

Reference; Harding Book 1, Page 307, Fig 1127

Price: £1650.00

A very rare and fine figure of William (Billy) Waters standing on a stepped square base, holding a fiddle in his left hand, one foot on the road and his peg on the kerb, wearing a plumed hat, jacket, neckerchief, waistcoat, and trousers. The source of this figure is an illustrated music front entitled ‘A portrait of Billy Waters, a progenitor of promenade concerts, he died about twenty years ago, by W.H. Montgomery.’ This sheet was published circa 1840 as the production was revived many times during the Victorian era. It will be noted that even though Billy Waters was a real person, he was characterised in Pierce Egan’s book Tom and Jerry: life in London or The Day and Night Scenes of Jerry Hawthorne Esq. and his elegant friend Corinthian Tom in their rambles and sprees through the Metropolis, which was in turn produced into an opera in three acts, performed at the Adelphi Theatre in 1821. The irony is that whilst the production was a huge success, running for over 300 nights, the real Billy Waters died in poverty. This figure has a professional invisible repaired right arm and restored right hand, the bow has been added for effect. Made in Staffordshire, England c1845.